no_rules_freedomfandomcom-20200214-history
REVIEWING THE (UK) CHARTS 2018 Ep. 3
Hello and welcome back to Reviewing the Charts! Nothing much to say this week so let's just dive into the top ten. Top 10 *We finally, finally ''have a new chart-topper... but I'm not particularly glad to say it's still Ed Sheeran, even if it is with Eminem on "River", which is decent, I suppose. I'm just sick of Ed Sheeran right now. Never could I have thought someone so devoid of charisma or someone so boring becomes as big as they are. At least Eminem's getting his check. *Next we have a new runner-up in "Barking" by Ramz, moving two spaces up, and I can finally say I've heard this song. It's not too special, but I suppose it's better than most autotuned UK hip-hop that's popular right now. *Down to number-three is the sleepy slumber of a song, "Perfect" by Ed Sheeran and Beyoncé, which has started to lose traction here, but the US isn't sick of it yet. *Clean Bandit's "I Miss You" with Julia Michaels peaks at number four yet I somehow don't care at all, maybe because the song doesn't either. *Still making a play for the top spot is the Cardi B remix for "Finesse" by Bruno Mars at number five, which is amazing, by the way, check it out. *Taking a big Vocaloid drop to number six is Rita Ora's "Anywhere". Thank God. *That leads us to our first new top ten entry, "Never be the Same" by Camila Cabello, having a massive album-drop boost to number seven. *I am so, so happy about this finally getting in the top ten - and yes, this will be an honourable mention on my best list - the delightfully fun "Tip Toe" by Jason Derulo featuring French Montana at number eight. Why can this not cross over to the US? This is wonderful. *Taking MK's spot at number nine due to the new arrivals is NF with "Let You Down". *And finally to round our top ten off, the only non-mover in this top ten, "I Know You" by Craig David and Bastille. It's not that amazing of a song but could to see it having some staying power. Let's get to our climbers. Climbers There weren't many big climbers this week. but there have been a lot of minor climbs. The only major climbs go to Camila Cabello for the 22-space journey up to number seven from #29 last week with "Never be the Same", the even bigger 24-space boost for Dua Lipa's "IDGAF" off the video - which is fortunate, I wanted to see that excellent song in the top 20, as well as the seven-space boosts for "Decline" by Raye and Mr. Eazi off the Ramz remix at #15, "Rewrite the Stars" by Zac Efron and Zendaya at #19 and... "Feel it Still" by Portugal. The Man at #25... for some reason. Other minor climbs include "Breathe" by Jax Jones and Ina Wroldsen to #12, "This is Me" by Keala Settle and The Greatest Showman Ensemble to #13, "My Lover" by Not3s to #17, "No Words" by Dave and MoStack to #20, and Steel Banglez' posse cut "Bad" to #33. Fallers There a quite a few major fallers this week that fit into three categories: 2017 hits naturally fading away; "Wolves" by Selena Gomez and Marshmello down seven spaces to #24, "rockstar" by Post Malone featuring 21 Savage and "New Rules" by Dua Lipa down five spaces to #29 and #30 respectively, "Dimelo" by Rak-Su, Naughty Boy and Wyclef Jean down 11 spots to #31, Marshmello's "Silence" with Khalid down seven spaces to #35, "Blinded by Your Grace, Pt. 2" by Stormzy and MNEK down by six to #37, last week's debuts dropping hard; "For You (Fifty Shades Freed)" by Rita Ora and Liam Payne taking a 10-tonne drop to #21, as well as "Filthy" by Justin Timberlake thankfully falling by 13 spots to #28, and dead memes; "Man's Not Hot" by Big Shaq finally out of the top ten, dropping nine spaces to #18 - and it can stay out. Other minor losses include "17" by MK to #11, "Havana" by Camila Cabello and Young Thug to #16 despite the album drop, "Naked" by James Arthur to #22, "Him & I" by G-Eazy and Halsey to #32, "All the Stars" by Kendrick Lamar and SZA to #36, and finally (and hopefully) looking like it'll drop out the top 40 next week, "Shape of You" by Ed Sheeran to #39. Please, just go away! Dropouts Despite the large amount of fallers we had very few dropouts this week. The only losses are pretty natural - P!nk's nice little ditty "Beautiful Trauma" drops out from #34, "Symphony" by Clean Bandit and Zara Larsson drops out from #36, and "Finders Keepers" by Mabel featuring Kojo Funds drops out from #39. We also had the less than mournful loss for "Bartier Cardi" by Cardi B and 21 Savage dropping out right from its debut at #40. Good riddance. Now we've covered that, it's time to talk about our new arrivals. 'NEW ARRIVALS''' We just have a handful of new arrivals this week, so I guess it's time to just take a dive in and take a look at our small little selection of four pretty diverse songs that happened to all debut in the top 40 this week - they didn't touch the hot 100 before this. #40 - "She Loves Control" - Camila Cabello Despite “Havana” falling due to Camila Cabello dropping her self-titled album this week, a non-single did appear on the charts. Despite my refusal to listen to listen to the album at first, this tropical-feeling track makes me curious about the album’s content. The faux-reggae beat makes it obvious why this touched the UK charts, but those distorted buzzing synths stay in the background until a sudden burst of annoyance after the chorus, where Camila belts for no reason. This could have easily been a nice seductive Latin song about Camila herself loving control, but the belting really doesn’t fit with the admittedly decent production here. This is really nothing more than an odd, short track (with way too many similarities to “Never be the Same” in terms of lyrical content) that I’m surprised even charted. It’s boring but I suppose it could be likeable. #38 - "My My My!" - Troye Sivan It’d be a pretty controversial thing to say I don’t like Troye Sivan, but his boring voice and often boring production make him a snoozefest literally all the time. He’s ditched the faux-indie shtick for this single, going straight trap-influenced reverb-addict pop. Okay, so Troye Malone here isn’t exactly covered with reverb but his high-pitched echoing in the chorus is pretty grating and he’s pretty much just talking in the verses, so do I like the production? Can that save the song? No, with its stuttering snares and odd and unnecessary synth jabs, it doesn’t save it at all. The added “oh, my, my” vocals did really not to be there. We already have enough pitched-up repeats of that phrase. The synth lead isn’t in any way bad, just pretty uninteresting. I’ve seen more fun synth-pop-turned-trap to come out of last year, so you can watch out for that on my best list, because this is useless. Skip it. #34 - "Let Me Down" - Jorja Smith featuring Stormzy I’ve never heard a single song by Jorja Smith. Is this a nice first impression? Yes, of course it is. The very powerful Adele-like performance in the vocals contrasts the subtle piano melody and finger snaps in the production beautifully. The vocal melody is pretty damn nice too. Stormzy later appears in the second verse with a verse that brings a lot of inspirational lyrical content that he’s been a fan of lately, and I can’t blame him, it works. His verse leading into the chorus is a bit awkward, though, and I can’t say his more low-pitched rapping works in the second chorus, it just seems like a last-minute addition oddly-placed in the track, in the final chorus as well, where it’s way further in the mix than Jorja for some reason? This is a strange song and overall nothing really special, but I suppose it’s okay, despite how surprisingly harsh I’ve been on Stormzy – don’t get me wrong, I like him a lot. I’ll take it. #26 - "Strangers" - Sigrid I don’t know who Sigrid is. I don’t care who Sigrid is. She’s 21 but she looks like she’s 12. That’s the most positive comment I have to say about this song, and that’s just because of the video. She’s a good singer, I’ll give her that, and this works in the intro which has more piano-lead instrumentation, as well as finger-snaps and some twinkling melodies that work into the vocals pretty nicely, but then it turns into a dubstep-infused dance-pop track for the chorus... for no reason. For the rest of the song, finger-snaps, trap snares and Sigrid’s vocals complement a buzzing synthesizer and ugly “groove” of a bass. The lyrics are false deep because she sounds like she wants to be Halsey. No, thanks, one is enough. Even in the bridge, where it could go back to the more elegant production of the intro, it’s just that buzzing synth and it really does not work for me. Also, she says “woo” without any energy. That’s not how that word works, Halsey—I mean, Sigrid, I apologise. Yeah, I don’t care for this song at all. If you do, good for you, I see this getting a lot of positive buzz, but I’m not feeling it. Conclusion This week is a pretty slow one but we’ll have those – the UK charts aren’t always exciting or even remotely interesting, especially the top 40. There isn’t much competition for best of the week or worst of the week; these were all just mediocre tracks. I guess I’ll give best of the week to “Let Me Down” by Jorja Smith featuring Stormzy, for a decent enough track, with honourable mention going to... yeah, nothing this week can even attempt to stand up to “Let Me Down”. Dishonourable mention goes to Camila Cabello for putting me off that album even more in “She Loves Control”, and worst of the week is definitely going to Sigrid for “Strangers”. Next week, I predict more from that Camila Cabello album drop and if I’m lucky, Fall Out Boy appearing due to their recent album drop. I’ll see you next week on Reviewing the Charts. Goodbye. Category:Music Category:Songs Category:Mrs Chanandler Bong Category:Reviewing the Charts Category:2018